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"Trading her Tomorrows"

An astrological biography
of Janis Joplin

by Alex Trenoweth
(page 2 of 2)

During this time, Janis broke all her formally bad habits. She no longer drank or took drugs, she wore the buttoned up clothes of the respectable, she no longer wore her hair frizzy and wild but neatly done up in a bun - and she stooped swearing. “Aw man, you’re so *$!* boring!” the friends who came to visit would say. Janis would firmly scold them for their poor choice of words and politely refuse their offers to take her out on the town. Most telling of her determination to lead a normal life was her decision to see a counsellor.

Eventually it became clear to Janis that her fiancé would not be coming to collect her for marriage (he neglected to mention he was already married). Heartbroken, Janis decided that she wanted to return to singing and once again she left Port Arthur to sing in bars. The spell of Saturn had been broken.

During 1965, whilst Janis was playing it straight, Bob Dylan was playing it electrical. By the time Janis returned to the scene, beatniks were out and hippies were in. LSD was the drug of choice and the “British Invasion” was in full swing.

It was shortly after her move away from convention that Janis joined the establish band, Big Brother and the Holding Company. The band enjoyed a faithful following in San Francisco. From this point, it was only a matter of time before the band caught the attention on the organisers of the Monterey Music Festival. The Monterey Music Festival was the first of its kind and it was the forerunner of the legendary Woodstock Festival. It took place during the Uranus/Pluto conjunction and this, in turn, was conjunct the N. Neptune of the US.

For musicians of the same age, transiting Jupiter was passing over Pluto, the tip of a “magic triangle.” Natally Janis, Jim Morrison and Jimi Hendrix had this configuration of Uranus trine Neptune both sextile to Pluto. For these three members of the “Club of 27” it was a truly transformational experience: all three were launched from relative obscurity to nation-wide fame.

Janis was said to be exceptionally nervous before her Monterey performance but she told herself before going on stage : “Just do it like you’re never going to get another chance.” She held the audience in a trance with her performance and was thrilled to learn a few days late she had shocked the establishment by not wearing a bra on stage. That a respected music reporter admitted being hypnotised by her nipple only added to her ecstasy. She knew she had made it.

Natally, Janis had Neptune in the eighth house. Howard Sasportas pointed out that people with this placement often develop death fantasies or even self harm - a theory that could explain Janis’ rampant addiction to injected heroin. Appropriately enough Sasportas also points out: “Reminiscent of the rites of Dionysus, in the throes of physical love, they (those with Neptune in the eighth) satisfy the need to abandon and forget themselves.” Janis had already clocked up a number of both male and female lovers, but when both Uranus and Jupiter entered her eighth house, Janis seemed to move into over drive. Amongst her famous conquests were Leonard Cohen, Dick Cavett, Jimi Hendrix and most famously, Jim Morrison.

Morrison also had Neptune in the eight house and that the two would eventually find themselves attracted to each other is perhaps not surprising. They really were too much alike and their need for constant attention soon meant they were competing to out do each other with outrageousness. One of the most striking feature of Jim’s and Janis’ charts is that both have the unusual configuration of a two bi quintiles connected by a quintile. The quintiles point to an area of the chart that seems to highlight their creative talents. Jim’s quintile formation pointed downwards in his chart toward his Moon in Taurus. Here is can be seen that his need for creative expression (Sun in Sagittarius) together with his sexuality (Neptune in the eighth) charged his sensual nature. On the other hand, Janis’ quintiles pointed towards her ascendant, making it seem as if she oozed with sexuality (Neptune in the eighth house) and creative confidence (Jupiter in the fifth).

Janis, however, was hyper sensitive to criticism and Morrison made her cry when he told her she couldn’t sing the blues. Devastated, Janis bought a bottle of Southern Comfort to drown her sorrows. As she was about to open it, she suddenly got a better idea for what to do with it - she went back to Morrison and broke the bottle over his head, knocking him out cold.

Janis eventually left Big Brother but found performing with more professional musicians difficult. She was clearly happier on stage rather than in the recording studio and, having grown accustomed to a band too stoned to tune properly, found the perfectly tuned instruments in the orchestra a distraction.

In the summer of 1970, transiting Uranus in the eighth made an exact trine to her N. Saturn and Janis again decided she would return home. By this time, she had made so many scathing comments about her hometown and the people who lived there that when she appeared on the Dick Cavett Show, the audience thought she was joking when she said she wanted to be at her 10 year high school reunion. For Americans, a high school reunion is a time to not only reminisce and catch up with old friends but to show off. The temptation was far too much for Janis. “They laughed me out of class, out of town, out of the state, man,“ she told Cavett. Going to her hometown would be the ultimate revenge and victory for a woman as wounded by the past as Janis. Assembling a film crew to record her every move, Janis and her entourage descended on the small town of Port Arthur. Janis discovered (or maybe knew all along) that the only thing worse than being ridiculed was being ignored. There were no flags waving when Janis arrived and the only acknowledgement she received was a car tire as a reward for the person who travelled the greatest distance. Janis was devastated but tried not to show it.

In that same year, Janis’ progressed Sun passed over her ascendant. Natally, both Neptune and Jupiter made a bi-quintile to this point. Although well established and successful, Janis had not managed to quit her heroin habit as she always claimed she could. A friend who saw her shooting up told her heroin was not what life was about. Life is about doing the dishes and mowing the lawn, he told her. It’s doing the normal little things that makes you feel alive. Oh man, she told him, I don’t a life like that, I just want to burn out. With Pluto also knocking on the door of her eighth house, that is exactly what she did. One evening, after recording in the studio, Janis sat on the edge of her hotel bed and injected an unusually strong batch of heroin into her vein. She slumped forward and was found dead several hours later.

In reflecting on Janis, we should remember her triumphs. She was a prominent advocate of peace during the Vietnam war. Janis was a life long believer of freedom and equality and has gone on record as saying she would eliminate racial inequality if she had the power as America struggled with segregation and overt racial prejudice.

All at once, Janis was impossible, unbelievable, intellectually stimulating, beautiful, reckless, antagonistic, well loved, often imitated but never duplicated. She was unforgettable.

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© Alex Trenoweth 2005
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